<p>just got home from very quick ny trip to see my baby. Had a whirlwind saturday. Went to the met, saw boring guitar show and claustrophobic photography exhibit, with H, S’s (newish, unbelievably lovely) gf, and his roommate, who is the world’s nicest human being. Also brought our hostess. It was roomates birthday, so we kept trying to add festiveness, like stopping for hot chocolate, etc. Went to the very worst movie ever Just Go for It, with Adam Sandler and Jennifer Aniston. It was humiliatingly bad. I was embarrassed for them. Then Indian food, then dropped kids back at dorm. </p>
<p>Ive decided I dont like going to museums in a really big group because I spent most of the time anxious about keeping track of everyone, and the social anxiety of wondering if everyone is having a good time. Maybe if it had been a smaller museum.</p>
<p>Heard all sorts of stuff about the kids projects, all of them crazily conceptual. Sigh…</p>
<p>This morning H and I went to Chelsea Market for a snack, then up to the Jewish Museum and saw a really cool exhibit about Houdini. Now I am back home.</p>
<p>^^and you don come cut me bear skins!?!?
I went home with bagful of Trader Joe’s grocery (cupboard was bear bare) cook quick, ate, tell the kid I am gonna back to work.
he goes
“you wanna do my hometest?”
of course he is joking, divine Peter Cooper but truth be told, I might have just done it if I did not have this pile of work.
'tis alright. life goes on and on and on.
I see… switts, you wanted save me from dieing of green envy seeing them happy Cooperians/ Cooperites.
suffer in that conceptu contemp labyrinth!! you kids asked for it! </p>
<p>now where is Gmom with the report from manga date, eh?</p>
<p>yes…the manga date! dying for details on what the house was like, socks, etc? </p>
<p>…courage switters…it isn’t just coopers students…I just saw my son’s first kinetic sculpture and it is conceptual to the max…kinda cute but very weird too…certainly I can’t see someone breaking out the checkbook for it. I would link it but it is not on youtube. Darn. OK…I need to avoid the claustrophobic photo exhibit when I make it to NYC next month. Actually, with meetings with bankers from 8-5 it is hard to actually see anything of interest during these conferences. Hopefully I can play hookie for an hour or two…</p>
<p>OK off to the cash machine to get H cash for bolivia/argentina/chile …he leaves tomorrow.
…the secret to our being able to pay CMU is not letting H have a cash card for the past 20 years. Why write books on financial management when the answer is just make sure the really cheap person in the relationship is the only one with check book/credit card/cash card…</p>
<p>FAM- yeah but there is at least a thing left for there to be noone interested in buying. My kid’s last two 3d projects have involved a fairly decent amount of work, which ended in nothing left. Not even good video of the performance art aspect that lead to their being nothing left, since good video would imply forethought, and we all know guys don’t get that until they are at least 25. About the photo thing, it was Steiglitz etc, and would maybe have been great, but I hate crowds and was hot and tired and cross…</p>
<p>Bears, Im sorry I didnt find you, the trip was too quick, and my hostess was very clear that she wanted to be included in the festivities so there was little time and too many players. Also, you were busy with work. It would have been much more fun if you had been there.</p>
<p>Re conceptual art. The professors teach what was “in” when they were studying because that’s what they know which is why most art schools and departments actually lag behind what is really cutting edge. Conceptual art is so dated…in my humble opinion…and was never really all that interesting except for the time Chris Burden or someone similar put buckets of water around himself, attached live electric wires to his body and dared people to kick over the buckets or at least that’s how I remember that particular “piece”. Talk about taking risks! </p>
<p>But that was already years and year ago.</p>
<p>fammom is coming!!
who wanna do (no) Sex and the City???</p>
<p>smarty, dear… give our kids (and kaelyn) a chance
then all them artschools should now start teaching manga pronto, hun!!</p>
<p>manga is not cutting edge my dear bears
Maybe bears and dogs are cutting edge!</p>
<p>Ugh, so far my fantasies of a productive de-crapping long weekend are fizzling out. I suppose I have a few hours left, but I won’t be surprised to find these little, knocked-over piles of paper all around my desk on the floor tomorrow morning. D3 has slept past 2 PM for the last 2 days so at least she’s having fun.</p>
<p>Remember the guy who had himself shot as art? He also did something called, “You’ll never see my face in Kansas City” and then went to Kansas City for a weekend and kept a ski mask on the whole time. Funny, but a bit of a one-liner. </p>
<p>I was listening to this Malcolm Gladwell piece on later bloomers:</p>
<p>[gladwell</a> dot com - late bloomers](<a href=“http://www.gladwell.com/2008/2008_10_20_a_latebloomers.html]gladwell”>http://www.gladwell.com/2008/2008_10_20_a_latebloomers.html)</p>
<p>He compares two different authors, and also Picasso (prodigy) and Cezanne (late bloomer). It makes me wonder about supporting a child who is an artist, like Cezanne’s father supported him. It’s not as depressing a thought as it might be. Gladwell makes quite a case for the late bloomers.</p>
<p>Oh yeah, getting shot in the arm. I think that was also one of Chris Burden’s “pieces.”
Hmmmmmmmmmmm, well I’m just so not in awe of this sort of stuff. Actually I do like that not see my face “piece” but it definitely is a one liner. My prediction, a move back to the object but who knows, that’s the beauty of cutting edge, but all these art schools and departments that are so predictably lauding conceptual art is so predictable and so yesterday. Oh excuse I’m just a bit jaded today obviously.</p>
<p>Roll with that girl, actually 2pm isn’t so bad.
Isn’t interesting how they just keep forcing us to change our parameters in order to keep our sanity. Kids, gotta love 'em.</p>
<p>Interesting tidbit about Cezanne, maybe that explains his mosogyny, couldn’t get over having to live off his father’s largesse. Some deep seated hatred misdirected at women.</p>
<p>Here’s another problem I have with conceptual art as it regards young women, there are many who do these age appropriate but over the top “pieces” that have to do with sexual imagery particularly of themselves and then post it online or put it in a gallery.
When does it become exploitive of a young woman’s sexual acting out by a lauding of this sort of work by professors and when is it art.</p>
<p>Just wondering…</p>
<p>twitch twitch…
it become Art when it’s pleasant to look at, even better when you die young, with possible mental issue
Eva Hesse, Francesca Woodman
It might be still Art but live longer then get creep-er and creep-er
Kiki Smith, Nan Goldin, Yayoi Kusama
or stay cool and adorable till all gone shrivels away
Louis Bourgeois, Georgia O’keeffe, Cindy Sherman
I am sure there are many more. add on!!</p>
<p>and I think Cezanne was happily married to his muse, just that didn’t tell his folks 'cus she was not the “right” kind to his dad with $$$, where is the French money symbol?
I like the Mrs. Cezanne painting half finished than them apples.
he made her inmortal.
awwwwww</p>
<p>P.S.
smarty, have you seen “Black Swan” yet? there might be an answer…</p>
<p>Cezanne may have been happily married but from what I remember reading his wife wasn’t…happily married that is but perhaps I misremember. And the question then is what does one want, misery and immortality or an unknown existence of happiness. Ah but then are those the only two choices we have? Sorry folks don’t know what’s gotten into me today. Too much snow I suspect.
Haven’t seen Black Swan Bears but it’s on my list.</p>
<p>I’d pick beauty, wealth, genius, misery and immortality ( so it’s “n” I done misspelled)manga! drama!
then
misery and unknown—life story here. better sleep…</p>
<p>(after nap)
smarty!!
I got good one!!
bears and dogs are cutting edge, literally I cut out edges of traced patterns.
…lame. better go back to sleep.</p>
<p>how you doin? RD kids, Barney, lurkers
today is the day. office closes 4PM for receiving.
I will bump “CooperIQ” thread later with this years prompts.
good luck all!!</p>
<p>You got it
Bears and Dogs are cutting edge!</p>
<p>I had to do some shopping for my elderly aunt in Germany, so DH took manga-girl to her play date with manga-boy. We had some negotiating over the time she would spend at chez-manga. We settled on 2 hours and 55 minutes (she’s a tough negotiator - but I’m tougher and Dad was the enforcer). DH dropped her off in front of the house. Made sure she got in the door (I asked him “did you make sure the parents were there?” he looked at me blankly… sigh). </p>
<p>So the rest is only what I’ve gleaned from manga girl. She got a splinter in her finger when she went up the steps (from the stair rail); so the first order of business was for manga-boy’s Japanese mama-san to assist in applying first aid to the injured finger. I asked manga-girl if she had to take her shoes off and she replied “doesn’t everybody take their shoes off when they go to another person’s house?” (another sigh… in an attempt to keep my carpet clean (given the proclivity of Aspie-girl to track in mud and horsey-poop into the house) I always have the kiddos and DH take their shoes off. DH, in fact, is so well trained that in the course of leaving the house for the day he’ll take his shoes on and off four or five times because he invariably forgets things like his glasses, ID badge, phone, wallet – in fact Sunday after Church I got a call that he’d left his check book on the table where he stopped to by grocery gift cards… but I digress (bad habit, I know)). I asked manga-girl if she had to put on special Japanese shoes/slippers with frills/bows on toes and she said no, her socks were fine. </p>
<p>“So then what did you do?” I asked. “We played video games.” she replied. “Okay”. “What else??” “We drank soda”. “Okay”. “It was really cool soda!” “Oh?” “It had marbles in it.” “?” “Yes, Japanese soda with marbles in it, it was really cool”. “And”, she said, “manga-boy’s Dad is jealous that you went to China and now you’re going to Germany”. “I see”. “So are you going to get together again?” I ask. “Yes”. She says. Then more silence. “So then he has to pass a test” I say. “Test?” “Yep”. “oH”. More silence. After a while, she asks “What kind of a test?” “I’ll know it when I give it”, I say. “Oh”. So then I launch into an account of how another boy passed the ‘test’ for D1 – even though D1 was oblivious and knew nothing about any test. This boy’s Mom called me out of the blue. Her son’s birthday was coming up and he wanted to invite D1 to his birthday party. I think it was the 16th birthday, kind of a big deal. The family was taking a bunch of kids to the city to see a comedy show as part of the birthday celebration. But this boy had told his Mom that she had to get him a gluten free birthday cake because he wanted to invite D1 and he knew she couldn’t eat wheat… so even though it was his birthday, he had enough character to think of somebody other than himself and want her to feel included. So I explained to manga girl that this boy had “passed the test” but I wasn’t yet sure what exact test manga boy might face.</p>
<p>So I don’t think it falls into the category of puppy love or infatuation. I think they have common interests which is nice and in the end I’m more or less okay with them getting together again (as long as adults are around).</p>
<p>I liked the Gladwell article. I actually wouldn’t have a problem supporting D1 if she at least did more ‘stuff’ around the house. As it is, I leave notes and she ignores it. I had a long talk with the social worker who took her to Peekskill on Friday and heard that D1 is so ‘disempowered’ in most aspects of her life that the one place where she can wield ‘power’ is at home with DH and I. Social worker’s advice was to make like a duck in the rain and let it wash off my back and not get upset with her. Patience. patience. Patience. So I’ve been practicing. I didn’t yell all weekend. But I refused to cook for the kids when i got back Saturday from my errands and heard that DH had asked each of the three of them to wash dishes and they all refused. So DH and I had a nice dinner and ignored the three kiddos. One didn’t eat. One got herself a frozen meal. One munched on tortilla chips and salsa. </p>
<p>So it goes…</p>
<p>Thank you SO much for sharing this, it was a total pleasure to read about your DH and manga girl and boy and other daughter. And I must say I’m impressed about the no shoe training LOL</p>
<p>Kind of like the Work of Art contestant who did some explicit stuff? Am I thinking of the right show? So far, I’ve seen some conceptual stuff on MCAD’s website, but D does not do too much of that. She finished her first 3D project, which was a lamp and raven done in the Northwest Native American Style (they had to take an everyday object and use that to create something in the style of an artist they admire.) I told her she better not put it on the free shelf (as her roommate did with hers) when she was done with it, because I really like it!</p>